datamusicata

I am down here in San Diego.  I did a show last night with Joe Rathburn (www.joerathburn.com) and stayed with my pal, Jimmy Duke, (www.darkthirty.com) where I had a wonderful house concert experience in October.   He is another fellow who simply knows how to do it.  Every base is covered and the artist only has to focus on doing the best show that they can.

In any event, we came back from the show and I was hungry and decided to make half a sandwich.   As I was spreading the mustard on the bread, I realized that I was carefully spreading it evenly on to every single inch of the bread.    I was doing it as perfectly as I could.

Then I realized that that is exactly the way my mother would make me a sandwich.  She was the zen sandwich maker.   As a matter of fact, it was the way that she did everything.   Always as best as she could. 

As a child, I remember being impatient with her ways or childishly annoyed with how right she wanted to get each thing she did.  If it was folding laundry or cooking or cleaning…whatever, it just didn’t matter.   If she did it, she did it as best she could.

And by taking that stance, doing the very best she could, no matter what the task, she brought art and honor to the task and that in turn created joy within her.

Is there any other joy like doing something as best you can?   And that is the zen of doing.   Focus and the commitment to do it as right as you know how.

I realized that this is a wonderful gift that she gave to us.  She did it by example in everything she did.   It is something that my sisters and I simply have instilled in us.   We take joy in almost everything we do (well, we’re not saints, you know), and we try to do whatever we’re doing as best we can.

I’m not talking obsessive compulsive here, I’m simply putting forth the idea that if you bring this attitude to the next thing you do, you will discover that there can be joy and a humble pride of accomplishment in anything you attempt.

Even if you fail, you learn and you know that if it didn’t work, it wasn’t for lack of commitment on your part.    Although my Dad always said you only lose a war when you stop fighting, so perhaps what you learn from failure is that whatever you were doing didn’t work, but that doesn’t mean you stop trying.   You just stop trying to do it that way.   If that way doesn’t work, you try another way.

I believe that to try to do the same thing the same way after a failure is the colloquial definition of insanity.

Just something to think about while you make your next sandwich.